Lib Dems giving mixed signals on gay marriage

Where do the Lib Dems really stand on gay marriage?  Recently, Simon Hughes spoke to this issue in a video interview with Yoosk.  It was then widely reported - e.g. by gay media outlet Pink News - that Hughes had indicated that gay marriage will happen in this parliament.

However, that is a rather optimistic assessment of what Hughes actually said.  Indeed,  Hughes actually dampened expectations that gay marriage would be adopted as a matter of Lib Dem party policy, let alone coalition policy.

Hughes' full answer on gay marriage can be seen here:

Notice that the only concrete step towards gay marriage mentioned by Hughes is a 'consultation' by the coalition government, which had anyway already been previously promised by Lynne Featherstone.  Whether or not gay marriage ever sees the light of day depends, then, on how the consultation is handled by the coalition, and what its outcome is.  Hughes doesn't venture a guess on that - indeed, he says that he doesn't know what the outcome of discussions over gay marriage will be even within the Liberal Democrat party.  So, whilst he has some warm words to say for gay marriage, and speculates that we 'should' be able to get it in this parliament, he is certainly not committing to anything beyond the consultation as yet.

Moreover, Hughes implies that he would rather gay marriage were not adopted as a matter of whipped, Lib Dem policy, but were instead put forward as a mere free conscience vote.  He says:

I think that every Liberal Democrat MP will be free to come to their own decision. I don't think this will be a whipped vote matter, because there are matters of conscience around these issues, and I am keen that we don't say every single item is a matter of party policy.

Now, at the beginning of this year, Nick Clegg announced that he was a supporter of full gay marriage.  So it was a matter of considerable disappointment when the issue was omitted from the Liberal Democrats' 2010 manifesto.  At the time, the explanation for this was that there had not been time to debate gay marriage at the Lib Dems' Federal Conference.  Pink News was told that, eventually, gay marriage would be debated, and would be adopted as a policy commitment.*

Hughes' comments now suggest that he thinks a pro-position on gay marriage will not become a matter of Lib Dem policy at all.  To be sure, that does not mean it will not happen.  And gay marriage could still pass on a free vote, even if Lib Dem MPs were not whipped into supporting it.

Nonetheless, though, the Lib Dem position on gay marriage is a good deal more ambiguous than some reports suggest.  There is certainly no call for Lib Dem Voice to run the details of Hughes' interview beneath the headline: 'Simon Hughes: Coalition Government will legislate to allow gay marriage'.

*A small update: as commenter Jae tells me, gay marriage is now on the agenda for the Lib Dem Federal Conference this autumn (see Jae's own post on it here).  That is positive, but still leaves us with a situation in which (headlines in Pink News and Lib Dem Voice to the contrary notwithstanding) the Lib Dem Deputy Leader has said that, in his opinion, gay marriage will not (and perhaps should not) become a matter of whipped party policy.